Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1887-03-17
1.-THE CAR wEPT."

IRE CZAh WE'LL.
It is related by the latest cablegrams
that when the Car heard of the narrow
escape hehad from the Nihilist assassins on
Tuesday, he wept. If only the tears he shed
were those of contrition, some hope for the
political slaves of Russia might be enter
tanned. But they were not. Alexander
will harden his heart the more, and the
sitter will grow his neck, until imprisoned
democracy in Russia bursts its bonds and
sweeps Cars and all attendant little des-
potisms out of the way of the car of pro-
gress.
The methods of the Russian revolutions
lists, when they take the form of bomb
throwing and assassination all right think
ing men abhor; they are infamous beyond
the limit of any possible excuse. But let
US not forget that the Car of Russia is an
absolute autocrat. The principle that all
true governments spring from the consent
of 1.-THE governed, he utterly scorns. With
out constitutional warrant, without even
the semblance of representation of the peo-
pie, the Crown formulates DEGREES that be-
come laws, and are perfect symbols of the
absolute personal rule of one man over
millions of his fellow-men. OF course, in
any nation claiming to be enlightened
such domination cannot endure. The very
atmosphere of the age repels the sugges-
ton that it is possible Of long continuance.
The sect known as the Nihilists receives
little or no sympathy in America, because
their methods are those of wanton murder.
But we cannot deceive ourselves concern
ing the facts-the Nihilists are not of
class; on the contrary, they embrace peas
ant and nobleman, landed proprietor and
emaneipated serf, the merchant and the
aristocrat, the student and the scayenger,
the men of science, art and letters, and the
rag-pickers of the gutter. A cause that is
so comprehensive in the membership that
clusters about it cannot be without strength
for victory. We are not holding for the
Nihilists and their methods, but we look
at the facts as they present in everyday
news. They convince men at all open to
reason that there is q struggling spirit of
democracy in Russia that must dominate
some day. Its methods now are barbarous;
possibly it does not know its own desire
fully; it may not, probably does not, look
much beyond its present, or have any broad
conception of self-government. 1t has no
comprehensive idea of republic, it is not
even striving for that end; it asks for a con-
stitution with guarantees for personal
rights exceedingly limited, and which
American citizens would not consider at
all liberal
But this sentiment is backed by unques-
toned heroism of devotion. Men, who
day in and day out place life in the neither
balance for liberty and enfranehisement !;
whom the rigors of Siberia, the slavery in
deep-earth mines, the knout and the scat
fold have for twenty years failed to subdue;
men of all degrees who sacrifice home,
houses, lands, family, ALL for political free
dom; who do not hesitate to Justify the
crimes of the assassin by the ends sought
to be attained-such spirits are the fore
runners and prophetic couriers of the
gospel of human liberty They have
been taught by the iron hand of Czarism
and by ages of tyrannous rule, that cruelty
is means to political ends; that the'
power to take life iustifes the crime in a
king; that oppression, slavery, seryitude,
are the part of Russian subjects, and free
doln thing for rulers only; that the
thought of the soul must not be uttered in
Russia except by those willing to exchange
it for Arctic terrors; that plea for
liberty means Punishment, and word for
political manhood is a selfuttered decree
of death on the seaiiold.
What else can we expect in such a
country except Nihilism and its dynamite
methods? While we abhor them, while
we condemn assassins, let US not forget
that these men of Russia have been
scourged to this condition; that, after all,
their cry is for liberty such as we enjoy;
that they have never known the blessings
which enshrine us sovereign in manhood's
right, and that the declaration of
rights for which they suffer and die reads
strangely like our own. for which we con-
quered to independence; that there is not
single claim or petition in the bin they
present for solitary right that American
citizens do not enjoy in degree fve-fold
greater.